Introduction to the book

Introduction

Translated from Hebrew by Aviva Kamil

Past and recent generations look upon us from the pages of Pinkas Novogrudok. We consisted of generations of different types of Jews: Great Torah scholars and ordinary Jews, Mitnagdim and Chasidim, workers, scholars from the Yeshiva Beit-Yosef and academic scientists, Zionists and revolutionaries. All of these Jews left their impression on the institutions that they had built up: on the Yeshivot, the Hebrew and Yiddish schools, and other establishments and institutions.

All schools were filled with kindergarten children and studious Jewish pupils. All cut down, exterminated, woe to our loss!

Novogrudok took a place of honour in the cultural life of the Jewish people for over 500 years. It was uprooted and exterminated, along with all of European Jewry, by the murderous Nazi Germans, may an eternal curse befall them and their descendants forever!

The Pinkas is a type of link in the chain of Pinkasim that were customary in Jewish communities. They consisted of reports and documents of all the happenings in the community. They were vessels of tears and blood, of the few celebrations and the many sorrows that people experienced, as well as comments about good deeds. Devoted hands wrote the Pinkas in a simple language and with pure intentions, a testimony and a memorial to the Jewish communities.

The present Pinkas, the Novogrudok Pinkas, is here to tell the orphaned generation and generations to come all that the community experienced from its very beginning hundreds of years ago until its terrible destruction. The Novogrudok community was over many generations a warm nest for Jewish life and culture. Only a few were saved from the monstrous fire, a few who showed great heroism, who lived in the forests or in concentration camps and later were scattered around the world: U.S.A, Latin America. Only a few reached the safe shores of the liberated and independent Israel.

Some survivors and their brethren, although they left the town many years ago, still carried in their hearts a love for their hometown. They all dreamed of establishing a memorial for their mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, a memorial for the children and youths, who were cruelly murdered and buried in brotherly graves, to preserve for eternity the history of that splendid town in a memorial book, and for it to be a Kadish and a testimony for generations to come. It was a dream with many obstacles: they did not know if they would be able to find the material, the means and the dedicated people needed for the sacred task of publishing such a book. On annual memorial days in Israel and America, the day of the first slaughter, Yod Chet of the month of Kislev, the survivors expressed their wish to undertake that task, to publish the book. It took them twenty years to bring the project to fruition. Three years ago, at a memorial evening, the task was given to the members: David Cohen, Yaakov Kivelevich, Shlomo Kaminietzki (Kamin), Moshe Shteinberg-Sarig, who was the principal of Tarbutschool in Novogrudok, Yehoshua Yaffe, Dr.Aaron Mirski, Menashe Rabina and Yaakov Rudnitzki, the representative of the committee of ex-Novogrudoker. Their task was to collect the material, and to be the editors of the Yizkorbook. The Israeli committee of ex-Novogrudoker financed the initial stage of the project. A contact was made with the U.S.A committees and some people from the U.S.A joined the editorial staff: The famous personality Edna Kagan, who came, when young to the U.S.A, but kept a warm place in her heart for her home town Novogrudok had contributed greatly to this project. Our friend Chaim Leibovich, a holocaust survivor, joined the editorial staff. The two committees, in Israel and U.S.A, headed by the dear patriarch Mr Maslov, gave their blessings and their help to the editors.

Be blessed all you who wrote with bleeding hearts about all that they and the town went through. And be blessed all of you in Israel and overseas who contributed articles to this book.

After a year of collecting the precious material, following the request of our friends in the U.S.A, the editors turned to Dr. Eliezer Yerushalmi, an author and a teacher, a native of Novogrudok, to accept the post of technical editor. The editorial committee accepted his suggested title for the volume as Pinkas Novogrudok and the following chapters:

A. The history of the town and its Jewish community from its beginning to the W.W.2, including a chapter about great people, and one chapter from the old Pinkas.

B. The town and its Jewish life between two W.W.: businesses, culture, daily life, personalities and images.

C. The life of the town and its people mirrored in poetry, prose, legends and tales.

D. The holocaust and heroism during the days of the evil oppressors, may their name be erased.

To end with memorial candles to the holy and pure souls that went up in flames of the holocaust and the destruction. Many photos were included in the Pinkas.

The editorial committee presents with awe Pinkas Novogrudok to the natives of the town in Israel and the Diaspora, with a prayer in their hearts: let the words of this Pinkas be kept in our hearts and the hearts of our descendants'. Ya'aleh Ve'itkadash the memory of our beloved martyrs who were cut down by a cruel hand from the land of the living.

Yitgadal Ve'itkadash

We end the introduction of the Pinkas with sorrow. Two of our faithful and dedicated members of the editorial committee passed away.

The kindly Edna Kagan from the U.S.A, who dedicated her last years to the collection of the relevant material for the Pinkas, and inspired the editorial committee with her enthusiasm.

Dr. Eliezer Yerushalmi, for whom Novogrudok was a source of inspiration for his literary creativity. He helped faithfully in the editing of the Pinkas.

Both of them did not live to see the completion of the Pinkas. Their memory will be kept in the pages of the Pinkas.

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